Familiar
by Astheal
Summary: After all, being within constant shouting distance of the same person for sixteen years is bound to breed a unique familiarity with one another. The journey of Maleficent and Diaval, in between the brief scenes we are given in the movie, from their first encounter to their flight over Aurora's coronation. T for future blood. Meant as deep friendship, but could be read as Maleval.
1. First Frost

Loved the movie, but I found it a bit disorienting that so much time went by so fast. I greatly enjoy the relationship between Maleficent and Diaval, but they don't really address the fact that the two of them have been together for sixteen years. So this story is my attempt to draw out the movie into the full sixteen years that it truly is. It'll be told from Diaval's perspective, from his first encounter with Maleficent to the very last scene of the movie, and will focus on the relationship between the raven and the fairy. After all, constantly being within shouting distance of the same person for sixteen years is bound to breed a unique understanding of one another, and this is my attempt to explore that.

* * *

The first snow had come as a surprise to all of the farmers. Light, watery and superficially cold, its ominous nature lay in what it signaled to come, not in the actual snow itself. Winter was arriving, insistent and cruel to the tail end of autumn that still managed to cling stubbornly to what pride it had. A few leaves still hung on the trees, but the night of the first frost had left them brown and brittle. The in-between time had come quickly and powerfully, and it had thrown the farmlands of the border into an uproar.

The _birds,_ of course, had no such surprise; the cold had been building upon the horizon for days now, and the excitement of the scuttling two-legged farmers only served to whet their appetites. The harvest had been given a sloppy beginning, and the flittering shapes overhead had sharp claws and eager beaks to await what came next.

The conspiracy had settled onto a barn roof that morning, eyeing the nearby field of barley with hungry, clever eyes. The sun was well risen when one brave female of their number abandoned her compatriots and attempted a raid at the unthreshed grain, but the busy humans peppering the field waved her off before she could snatch anything substantial. She returned with ruffled feathers, but the only thing bruised was her pride, especially at the laughter of another raven, a glossier one, male, farther away, alone and different from the thick of the conspiracy but close enough to caw.

Squawking indignantly, she folded her wings and hopped closer to the others, shooting a challenging glare at him over her shoulder; she had at least _tried,_ after all, instead of simply laughing at another's failure.

Her onlooker shuffled to the edge of the roof, then, in response, peering at the farmers that had gotten back to work in the field. There was a small human perched on the fence, watching the conspiracy warily. It was he who had pointed and shouted at the she-raven, followed by the farmers' sharp, waving tools. The small-farmer's eyes landed on the searching raven now, cautious and waiting. The raven, in turn, kept an eye on him, too.

There was a rhythm to the threshing. Stalks were bundled by one farmer, then cut by the other. A third would take the bundled grain to a pile, watched over by the small one. Bundle, cut, carry. Bundle, cut, carry.

The raven dropped from the edge of the roof and spread his wings, climbing high before the small one had cause to point and shout. There he circled, watching the farmers bundle and cut and carry. The small one watched him, but did nothing.

He tucked his wings and dropped like a stone from the sky, coming into a tight swoop over a bundle of grain that had not yet been cut. He grasped at it before he had even come to a complete halt, beating his wings and digging his beak into the stalks for the heavy heads of seed that remained there. One, two, three grains, more; he stabbed and pecked and gobbled them down fiercely, even as the small human shouted and pointed. He heard the farmers with their voices and metal tools rushing through the grass, but he had left the bundle long before they reached him and was beating his way back into the sky.

He returned to the conspiracy on the roof, neck fluffed proudly as he settled back amongst the other young ravens with a full stomach and a full beak. The she-raven that had tried and failed shook her shoulders haughtily, but he was not dissuaded––instead, he hopped closer and deposited the uneaten grains that remained in his beak at her feet. Others cawed and shoved each other to try and get closer, but the she-raven snapped the grains up and fluttered away from the roof. The one who had given them to her spread his wings and followed, even when she dipped and banked and cut through the air at dizzying speeds. He was unshakable, and was quite proud of it; after all, he was the fastest raven in the conspiracy. In all conspiracies, if he'd any say about it.

She circled back and eventually came to land back on the rough shingles of the barn roof. Other ravens were mimicking him now, trying to snatch at the uncut bundles, but the farmers had become wise and were shooing them away. There was a shuffling as the female claimed room, then as he followed. He had hardly set his feet on the wood before she was turning and hopping, this time _towards_ him with a cheerful glint in her eye. She cawed, he cawed back, then _he_ jumped back off of the roof and into the air, with her following closely behind.

He stretched his wings and soared, diving through the buildings of the farm. He dipped and rolled theatrically, clipping thatch with his claws and almost skimming walls with the very tips of his wings. There he saw an unattended cart, and so he tucked his wings and swooped underneath, between the wheels, belly almost scraping the dirt, and emerged from the other side without stopping. He flapped once, twice, reclaiming altitude until he could settle himself comfortably on a stone chimney and turn to look for his companion, who was not nowhere to be seen. A moment's search and he saw her in the distance, above the buildings, circling in confusion; her wings were no match for his, and she had been unable to keep up. As he watched, another bird rose to meet her, too large to be female, and dipped playfully in the wind underneath; a suitor, one that did not have _his_ good wings.

Miffed, the raven abandoned the chimney and quickly crossed the distance to the female, cawing for attention. She glanced at him, but the other male soon became more concerning; he squawked aggressively and sped up, snapping his beak and pivoting to hover in between the female and the competition. This new raven was larger, and surely older, but his wings were fat and slow and his feathers weren't nearly so glossy and well-tended as his more agile opponent. Where the younger had been playful, the older was serious in his suitorship––he was courting with deeper intent than the youth, who did not see the female as worthwhile cause a fight. _He_ was young and far too beautiful to worry about nest-building, and so he surrendered his altitude and dropped from the courtship.

He had thought that to be the end of it, until sharp claws came to score his back.

Cawing in pained surprise, the young raven looked up. The elder had descended as well, snapping viciously as he slid past with long, grasping claws. The younger was immediately inclined to look behind him––what on earth had that brute done to his feathers?––but there was no time; the other was coming back for another go.

Flying higher, the young raven did his best to distance himself from his aggressor, although it was too sudden and unexpected for him to be particularly graceful about it; his opponent recovered before he did and rose to meet him, driving the younger higher and farther from the farm and female.

Indignantly, the younger pulled his wings and dove, clipping the brute on the top of the head in warning. He didn't want the female _that_ badly, not nearly as badly as the brute seemed to; there was no reason to battle!

But the brute would have no reason, and now their positions were reversed; he had the high wind, and the young had the low. He remained aloft, vocalizing warningly, but did not dive; he stayed high, pushing the young raven through the farmlands and away from the usual flights of the conspiracy. It wasn't until the last farm faded into flat scrubland that the elder relented, wheeling above and back towards the farms while the glossier male continued on.

With the sky now unbarred, the creature rose back up, taking note of the warning glares from the retreating brute. To return to the conspiracy would surely ignite another fight, at least tonight; the shimmering raven might never have courted with the seriousness of the larger one, but he had observed pairings enough to know that the aggression would not last forever. A day of separation, and the unrest would almost surely die down enough for him to return. And besides, he had filched more than enough of the farmers' grains to be content for a night; he had no need to return to the conspiracy. Ravens were more solitary than social beasts, anyway; his dislike for trouble did not outweigh his desire for company.

With that decided, all that remained was to find a place to roost the night.

Beyond the farmlands lay a jagged spread of rock and dirt and grass, distressingly free of trees or crags that might give shelter from the early-winter wind. And he certainly wouldn't want to return to the farms prematurely; the sun was descending, but there were still enough hours left to find _something._

He was very high indeed before he managed to spot the telltale spike of something made by human hands, deep into the scrublands. A once-castle, now ruined and skeletal under the steady hands of time and weather, but solid and arching and certainly a more pleasant roost than open rocks. The only catch was that it did look awfully far, and the hours were passing by; he picked up his pace and angled towards it. He wanted to reach the place while there was still warmth; winter nights made his feathers stick together unpleasantly.

He made it just as the last strip of sunlight vanished below the horizon. His wings were the only sound in the vastness of the stone ruins; there were few creatures that ever visited this once-castle, even in passing. Perhaps it was the barren land, or the height, or the lingering feeling of hollowness that seemed to have always been there. Perhaps it was the fact that even the fairest of days could not alleviate the gloom and shadows. Perhaps it was any combination of such reasons. In any case, it was not a place any creature lingered for long, but the raven didn't need to linger. He could rest for a night and be on his way, and with the pleasant certainty that no other beasts would disturb him.

With night quickly growing and in no mood to remain aloft for longer than he had to, he spilled air from his wings and cawed to announce his presence. He didn't particularly expect any other creatures to respond, but it was only polite to do it anyway. He came into a low, controlled swoop to the once-windowsill of a once-tower, the roughened brick course and cold beneath his feet. He fluffed his feathers, folded his wings and hopped deeper into the darkness of the stone walls, where the wind would be less vigorous and where his feathers would keep him warmer.

In doing so, however, he was incredibly surprised to discover that he was not alone.

Company stood on the other side of the tower, where the wall was thicker and less weathered, watching him with gleaming golden eyes. He cocked his head and peered at her; she was woman-shaped, with high, gliding cheekbones and skin the color of milk. From her head sprouted brown hair, and from beneath the hair sprouted two proud, spiraling horns, dark and ridged and decidedly not at all human, although she was certainly not beast-shaped, either.

Before he could think any more on the matter, the air around the woman swelled with something other than wind. The raven cawed indignantly and hopped backwards as something _else_ burst from inside the tower, something rough and primal and magical that burst in a distressing display of color at his feet, pushing him to the edge of the windowsill. Well, he was certainly not going to share the tower with such rude company! Cawing in righteous distress, the bird forsook the perch for the open air to find somewhere more peaceful to roost.

He didn't look, but he could have sworn he felt a gaze on his back as he retreated.

In the end, the raven found a higher, less sheltered but altogether more agreeable perch in the skeleton of a short, scraggly tree that had taken root in one of the courtyards, where he settled comfortably and ruffled against the wind. He tried his best not to puzzle over the woman in the tower, over why such a creature had found herself in the most hollow and desolate of places, nor why one of the Fair Folk might be so far from the Moors. It wasn't his puzzle, and besides there were more pressing matters to attend to. Like what the brute raven had done to his beautiful feathers.

Although the journey had wearied him, he was not one to leave wrong things unrighted, and he took the time to peer over his shoulder and survey what the fight had wrought, squawking in distress when he saw the scored vanes and bent barbs. His beautiful back had been absolutely mangled! He immediately dug his beak into the mess, straightening and organizing; everything was out of place and hideous, and he _wouldn't_ stand for it. Those two were crossed, that vane had been split far too many times, that one was so disorganized it could have been mistaken for a downy feather. All these he took, one at a time, carefully and caringly, pushing them back to their proper places and sliding them through his pinched beak to smooth down the irregularities. He didn't intend to rejoin the conspiracy the next day, but that didn't matter; no matter where he went, it just wouldn't _do_ to be anywhere without every feather in the best order. It was a careful, time-consuming task, and the moon was well over the horizon by the time he had finished it to his satisfaction; he tilted his shoulders this way and that, watching the light glint and shimmer off his iridescent back until he was absolutely sure that it was in pristine condition, continuous and unblemished. Only then did he finally settle, shifting his feet so he could squat and cover them from the cold. The wind howled, but in his shelter he was protected rather well; he'd always preferred trees to ledges, in any case.

With his feathers in order, and with his day complete, the raven let go of any farther worries and drifted into sleep.


	2. Old Words

Apologies for the retreading of scenes you've already seen in the movie. It should let up in the next few chapters, since I have to fill in that big nine-month blank. Also, I'm currently looking for someone the beta this story, so if anyone feel willing to give up some of their time to read my drafts I'd be most obliged!

* * *

The next day was cold, although not so cold as it had been the day before. Snow still dusted the ground, but it was no longer falling in useless puffs. The sky remained a smooth, stubborn gray, and the air remained halfheartedly chilly. As it was, the raven did not awake to an especially _un_ pleasant morning, although it wasn't quite nice, either. It was what it was, and he had kept acceptably warm through the night; the first frost had not been followed by a second one, and the sky spoke of no more flurries. At least not today. Tomorrow, perhaps, otherwise almost certainly the day after, and a wise beast would gorge itself before that; if the snow came late, it would come heavy and thick, and then food would be even more elusive than it already was.

He left the once-castle just as dawn began to make itself comfortable in the east, relishing the light on his feathers. His smooth and _orderly_ feathers, he was proud to acknowledge. He would pay particular attention for the brute when he returned, and might possibly bother him if he had the chance. If he had a food cache secreted away somewhere, then double the mischief. Food would be a smart priority, and play could come later.

The flight felt somewhat shorter this way around, possibly because he wasn't trying to outrace the sun. He had plenty of time to make his way back to the farmlands, and he was warmed by the thievery of the day before; he was not at all worried for what the border of the human-lands might hold for him now, not from the farmers or the other ravens. He passed over the first farm by mid-morning, and then he rose high to watch for other conspiracies that might be gathering around food. There were a handful of ravens here and there, but nothing so large as the congregation that had occurred yesterday; the best part of the harvest had been completed hastily, and there were no other causes for a large, proper conspiracy.

He would be finding food by himself, then, which didn't bother him at all.

The barn roof of the previous day had been abandoned, which suited him nicely as a starting point. He landed, shuffled, and settled, scanning the farm and its activities. She-farmers busied themselves just outside their nest, fooling with their white cloths and buckets and water, but there… no, wait, the small one, from yesterday, he had appeared from nowhere, trotting over to the she-farmers with something in his hands. An exchange, words too far away for the raven to make out, and then the boy was moving again, towards the barn. The raven tilted his head, but remained silent, and the boy had soon disappeared inside the building upon which the bird stood. There was shuffling, the moving of hay and grass, and cloth? Then what sounded like raindrops, but the raven knew to be so much better: the sound of moving grain. In short order the little one had come out again, now burdened by a bucket of beautiful barley, closed the door behind him and started his journey back to the she-humans.

The barn. The grain was in the barn.

The raven dropped from the roof and circled the building once, gaze catching on the wooden windows. He'd seen the humans open those windows before, for the animals, but they were solid and wooden and far too heavy to break. The raven dipped closer. How did they… there! On one side, the turning-side, were the hinging metal bars that creaked and stayed together when the windows opened, but on the _other_ side were hooks and loops that came apart. The raven came to hover near one of them, filled with glee; to think such simple things could keep _him_ out! He unhooked the latch from the eye and tugged, and the window swung open on its hinges and allowed him in. Humans were clever, but perhaps not so clever as they thought they were. Certainly not so clever as he was.

The inside of the barn was musty and dusty, made worse when the donkey startled and kicked up her bedding as the raven flew through her stall. Small not-rooms circled the entire structure, filled with animals and tools and human-things, but the center was open and easily navigated. There was even a ledge up top filled with hay for him to land on and look over the place, although his rest there did not last long: on the ground he spotted the recently-mussed straw of the small one's passage, all centered around a pile of rough-cloth sacks. Was that their precious grain?

Warily, the raven leaped from the hay-ledge and glided through the barn supports to reach the sacks. They shifted underneath when he landed, over countless small things that moved and sounded like raindrops. Yes! He pecked at the cloth. This was their treasure!

The sack was closed at the top, and bound by tightly knotted twine, something that would be more challenging than the hook-and-eye latch. Hopping closer, the raven pecked once experimentally, then found a single length of the string and tugged. Through the knot, he saw another portion respond. Again, to a different length. Again, another response. It was all one string, he realized, long enough to wrap and tie. And certainly enough to untie.

It was almost a game, this new obstacle, and one the raven found thoroughly enjoyable. The rope was not alive, the rope would not learn; it was a dead thing that only waited to be acted upon. What difference did it make to twine whether it should be untied by a human or a raven? For untie it he did, and when the string sprung free it let loose a waterfall of barley that spilled over the floor and into the dirt.

The raven cawed excitedly and leaped into his prize, not even bothering to use his wings as he slid into the cascade. There was more grain in one sack than he could hope to eat in a year, and he could easily last a week on only what he could gorge himself with now. With no desire to waste time, the raven set about to scooping up and devouring the food he was bathing in.

It was a small while before he was interrupted.

The front door creaked and light speared the swirling dust of the barn, followed by the tall, stooping silhouette of one of the farmers. The raven squawked, startled, alerting the farmer to his theft, but was already flapping and in the air before the farmer could make sense of it.

"Blasted thief!" the farmer shouted as the raven managed to drag itself to the hayloft. "Blasted bird! I'll eat you for dinner, you damned raven!"

Not particularly keen on the idea, the raven left the hayloft for the higher spaces between the rafters, then swooped down, over the farmer and out the open door, followed by a thrown boot and the farmer's curses. As soon as he was back in the sky, however, the raven's worries faded; he hadn't been able to completely and utterly stuff himself, but his belly was still full and warm and far too comfortable for an extended flight. He had eaten too much to go a great distance, or he would surely become sick; he wanted to stop and rest, somewhere he could preen and wait for the feast to sink into his body.

As if hearing his thoughts, a perch presented itself in the form of a bizarre concoction of sticks and cloth, stuck in a nearby field of tall plants the raven was too heavy to bother thinking about. The stick-thing would do well, and he settled clumsily onto it. Such a strange thing, this creation was; two cross-sections nailed together, woven with sticks, hung with cloth and topped with one of the humans' funny straw hats. The raven pecked at the hat, somewhat curious; she-farmers regularly left cloths out in the open for no discernable reason. Perhaps this was their work? It seemed to have no other purpose, at least not to him.

But the matter's importance was small, and was growing smaller; he was full and warm and smug, and he found himself nodding sleepily before he could help it. His meal slowed him, made his wings and eyelids heavy, and it was a fine perch no matter what strange madness had sent them to build it. Humans were odd, random creatures, almost as random as they were predictable. He didn't need to know _why_ it was here, only that it _was._ And that cloth-covered sticks were very comfortable places to stand. Even better, to sleep.

* * *

He was woken with chaos.

He was moving, too fast to understand. Noise, barking. Dogs? Something was on top of him, heavy and vast, and he was being pulled––he screeched and flapped his wings, to get away from the sudden distress, but his wings wouldn't work; atop him lay cords and twine in a soft ceiling, and he could only strike it uselessly with his shoulders.

Down he went, onto the ground, and closing in were the barks and snarls of dogs, _huge dogs_ that stank and shouted and bared glittering teeth. He continued to flap and shout, and it _should_ have startled his captor enough to slip away, but cords and twine were not easy captors to startle. They dragged him, kicking and squawking, through the dirt, through the dogs, through harsh laughter, and then he was being tossed.

He hit the ground and the net fell over him, tangling up his wings. He managed to get his feet under him, but no matter how hard he pushed and flapped, the net kept him down. And the dogs, the _horrible_ dogs, they continued to bark and bellow.

"I've got ye!" shouted the stooped farmer, dancing around the edge of the net with a wicked grin. Then the farmer danced off, knowing the raven could not escape, and returned with something long and heavy––a club, wooden and rough, which he raised over his head. The raven struggled even harder, if it was even possible; he had to do something, _anything_ to _get away,_ to escape the club and the net and the dogs and oh no stop the club was coming down!

 _Into a man._

A whisper underneath the breeze, not of sound. Through the air, through the grass, through the net, through his feathers––it pierced the world, strong and deliberate, and clutched the raven at the core.

Something was happening.

He knew it by the sudden rising of the net, and the sudden distance to the ground. Had he made it away? No, the net was still above him. He turned to look, but his legs bucked from underneath him; he was suddenly too heavy, and they were suddenly too long. The dirt sharpened, and the rocks stood out against his feathers. No, not his feathers, there were no feathers. What?

He scrabbled, reaching for the ground, the net, for _something_ to brace against. With his wing, now terribly large, he managed to raise the cruel trap away and look back up, to the sky, to the grass, to the whining dogs and the prone farmer that looked at him now as if he was some monstrous thing.

"It's a demon!" the farmer cried, scrambling to his feet and dashing away with the dogs hot on his heels.

The raven, for his part, was too occupied with his own situation to take much notice. He twisted, finding his feet and standing––why was he so _tall?_ ––to see that his feet were all wrong. So were his legs, and––no! His lovely feathers! Where had his lovely feathers gone? He threw off the net and looked to his wings just as the last of what he had once been changed into what he now was, hardly able to comprehend it. There were no wings anymore, only these… _things._ Long and fat and at the very end of revoltingly long arms. Oh no, what about his tail?

The raven turned, trying desperately to spot anything that might remain of his tail, but there was nothing! Not one feather! He turned, glanced away from his body, searching for something resembling an explanation…

… and caught sight of _her._

Tall. Pale. Built like a blade. Wrapped in cloth the color of fall aspens. All angles and edges, crowned by the same two spiraling horns.

 _Her._ No thought was needed to know where he had seen her before.

It was _her_ words that had slipped under the wind.

 _She_ was the one responsible.

He watched her, eyes narrow and wary. "What have you done to my beautiful self?"

She stepped closer, out of the grass and onto the dirt clearing. Unperturbed by his caution, she circled close and responded with a voice that was quiet and cold. "Would you rather I had let them beat you to death?"

He looked down, at the long and gangly and featherless and decidedly _not-raven_ shape he now possessed, then back up to her.

"I'm not certain," he said, not at all sure how to handle this new situation but quite certain that he didn't like it.

"Stop complaining," she commanded. "I saved your life."

 _I saved your life._ Yes. She had, hadn't she? The farmer and his dogs were nowhere to be seen. He was safe. He was alive. Alive, facing of certain death but for her intervention.

 _She saved my life._ Even as thoughts, the words were heavy. They were old words, which transcended languages and kingdoms and time. They were heavy, because lives were heavy things in a heavy world.

And in a heavy world, nothing came without a price. He had been given something, and the world demanded something in return. Lives… they were old things. The first of all things to be traded. It was a rule of the world, like the movements of the sun or the changing of the seasons. One of the old rules, that lay deep in the bones of the Fair, the Humans and the Beasts alike. Binding him, as it bound all things.

She had saved his life, and so his life belonged to her.

She watched the wheels turn in his head, infinitely patient. She saw the click when came to his realization. In the golden sheen of her eyes, he saw his thoughts reflected.

She had not saved his life out of the kindness of her heart.

"Forgive me," he said, shifting backwards. It was an unspoken acceptance, a show of submission and understanding. He knew he was in debt to her, and he told her so in the lines of his neck and shoulders as he retreated, open and aware.

"What do I call you?" the Fair One asked.

"Diaval." He straightened; he didn't like things going unvoiced, and was perfectly willing to speak what they both knew to be between them. "And in return for saving my life, I am your servant." He dipped his head respectfully. "Whatever you need."

"Wings," was her echoing reply. She met his upward glance with glassy, golden eyes, bottomless, shivering and hollow. "I need you to be my wings."

* * *

Constructive criticism is always appreciated. I also might be changing the name of the fic soon; now that I have a better idea of where I'm going, _Shift_ doesn't seem as appropriate a name.


	3. Empty Eyes

Three chapters in three days. I'm on a roll, although this one's a bit shorter than its predecessors. Again, I'm in sore need of a beta, in case anyone out there has time they'd be willing to spare.

* * *

"These are _useless,_ " Diaval grunted, dragging at the worn leather boot he was trying to pull onto his fat, flat, _hideous_ feet. What were these even feet good for? He couldn't even hold a stick with the first two toes, much less the entire appendage. How did humans get by with such idiotic things to walk on? It made no sense.

 _She_ made no comment. His new mistress stood off a ways, leaning against a tree and gazing off silently into the distance. Towards the castle, near as he could tell. He was fairly certain she'd heard him, judging by how loud he'd spoken and her occasional responses to other things he had said, but this was not something she deemed worthy to comment on. It left Diaval feeling a bit put out, to go through so much trouble and not receive as much as a _thank you,_ but he couldn't very well say that out loud; it was bad enough that she'd asked––no _ordered_ ––that he bathe in one of the she-farmers' buckets of water, and then that she'd tossed the billowy black clothes at him with the expectation that he _put them on,_ of all things, but _this…_ these boots were simply ridiculous. Heavy and cumbersome, with no discernable value; he would have thought them to be some sort of cage for his feet, until he realized that human feet couldn't do anything anyway. In that light, his entire body was a cage of sorts; he was weighty and bulky, not at all nimble and not nearly as beautiful as he was _supposed_ to be. And no wings! That was the worst of it.

"How do humans do it?" he asked, more to the air between them than to his mistress directly. "They can't even _fly_."

The chill on his back was instant, crawling under his skin as she lay her eyes on him. He looked up, and he was met with the same deep, unfeeling eyes. They unnerved him, those eyes; even the most stupid of beasts had open eyes. Eyes reflected what was inside, what one thought and wanted. Humans and Fair Folk spoke with words, but beasts had no words. Only eyes, which were almost like words, amongst each other. Humans and Fair Folk spoke with their eyes too. They were _supposed_ to, at least. But her eyes were like stone, unchanged, even as she seemed to be attempting a glare. Her attempt didn't work. Her eyes remained empty, and it left Diaval uneasy to look at her and see nothing of what lay underneath. It was irritating.

Her not-quite-a-glare made him wonder if he had done something wrong, but he couldn't find it in himself to be truly _afraid_ of her, not when her face was so hollow. And so he didn't look down or avert his eyes; if he had done something wrong, she would have to say it out loud. He held her gaze unflinchingly, cocking his head and waiting for an explanation.

None came. No reprimand, no acknowledgement that he had erred. An empty look, and then his mistress turned away.

"Your form is temporary," she said, settling back to stare at the castle again.

He perked up. "How temporary?"

"Enough to tell you what I need. You are of no use to me on the ground."

Diaval blinked. She had already told him what she needed. "You need me to be your wings."

She didn't even look back at him. "Put your shoes on." And that was the end of that.

Diaval returned to his infernal task in silence, and in time managed to wrestle the thing onto his foot. The second boot was vastly easier once he knew what to do, although the strings at the top remained a mystery to him. He pulled the strings tight and tied them to keep out of the way, then pulled on the grubby black traveling cloak they'd managed to filch from the scarecrow. It had belonged to one of the farmers who was much larger than Diaval, but the raven couldn't help but feel as if it was too small. Phantom feathers _wanted_ to burst free of the sleeves, but it wasn't real; his mistress had taken his feathers away, and so he had to wait and endure the irritation and ugliness of a human shape until she decided otherwise.

He stood to signal to her that he was finished. Again, there was absolutely no change in her posture to suggest that she was even aware of it––even though she soon turned, without glancing at him, and began walking away from the farm.

Diaval followed, and it was when her back turned that he saw the blood.

Old, clotted straight into the back of her robe, the blood was black and crusted and stretched inside the cloth, which was itself slashed by two massive gaps over her shoulder blades. Under the gaps, Diaval caught the briefest glimpses of scabbed and cracking skin, enough to form two visible bumps under the material. That was also when Diaval noticed that when she walked, she walked in pain; she leaned heavily on her warped black staff, bent slightly forward, presumably to escape the pain of her back. Two slashes, made recently. And by the look of it, they were also burned.

His mistress turned and glanced at him over her shoulder, and her glare almost felt like a physical strike; it was suddenly _not_ empty, not at all. The once-blank eyes were suddenly all fire and hot iron and aggression and _hate_ , and he blinked in surprise. Where had those eyes come from?

He had been staring, he realized. Her eyes were commanding him to stop.

Diaval cast his gaze down obediently, although his curiosity now fluttered within him like a thousand aggravated moths. She returned to watching the path in front of them, and he hesitantly caught up to her shoulder, where he would not be tempted to stare at her back.

"Where are we going, Mistress?" the raven asked, trying not to sound intimidated.

" _You_ are going to the castle." The way she said it made it clear he was going alone. "You are to find someone and report back to me."

"Who?"

"His name is…" She choked on nothing, then swallowed and took a breath. "St… Stef… an." She lowered her head and closed her eyes, grimacing with effort. "Stefan. You are looking for… Stefan."

 _Stefan._ "What's he look like?"

"Brown hair. Blue eyes. Large hands." Her words seemed to leave her breathless.

"What do you want me to learn, Mistress?"

"Everything. Where he is. What he's doing. Why."

"For how long? When am I to return?"

"You are to take as long as needed. I want _everything."_

If he was a raven, he would have shuffled his feet. "And where will you be, Mistress? Where do I go when I'm done?"

"The ruins to the north, do you know them?"

"Where you were last night?"

She glanced at him, eyes now half-sparking was a dull, deadened curiosity. "You were that bird, then."

"Aye."

She gave the barest hint of a nod. "That is where I'll be. Now go."

She raised a hand, golden magic swirling at her fingertips.

 _Into a raven._

* * *

Constructive criticism is always appreciated. Also, quick note: I might be bending the canon a bit in the next chapter, since I hardly think Diaval could have possibly gotten all the information he needs in the _ten seconds_ he spent watching the coronation before reporting back to Maleficent in the movie. I'll do my best to keep it from dragging out, since I don't imagine Diaval has ever spied before, but I'll be adding in some bits to make it a bit more than it was in-canon.


	4. Wings Of The Vanquished

Wings! His wings were back, and so were his thick, glossy, _beautiful_ feathers!

Diaval slid through the air, unbelievably happy to fly after the weighty clumsiness of manhood. The kingdom slid into a blur beneath him, because he was inspired to fly as _fast as he could_ to make up for the unpleasantry of skin and hair and those clunky, idiotic _boots._ He wanted to taste the sky; he wanted to taste _speed._ He pushed his wings to their limits; everything was back as it should be, and he wanted to _prove_ it.

Of course, while his speed did help greatly to assuage the feeling of his first shape shift, it also assured a hasty trip to his destination.

He reached the castle just before noon. It was much larger than he had expected, although it didn't look quite as large as Mistress's once-castle might have been before the time and weather sunk their teeth in. This castle was tall and strong, with sharp-cut stones and thick mortar and fluttering wall-banners and roof-standards. It was nearly, if not actually taller than it was wide, as long as one didn't count the sloping little buildings that trailed down the hillside towards the city.

The castle was also near to bursting _._ The streets and alleys were filled to the brim with people, colorfully dressed or thickly armored or some combination of the two. Heavily horsed knights wove their way through brightly decorated courtiers, shouting and ushering this way and that. Diaval had never seen so many humans in one place. Was this typical? Surely not. The raven dropped from the sky, coming to rest on a rooftop over one of the bustling streets. He had come here with a task.

 _Brown hair. Blue eyes. Large hands. Stefan._ How was he supposed to find anyone based on that?

Brown hair. That was a start. And male; Mistress had said 'he,' hadn't she? She wanted a brown-haired man with blue eyes and large hands. In this crowd, that was both the easiest and most difficult thing to find.

There was a man with brown hair, and another one, and another, and another. That one and that one had blue eyes, and Diaval knew absolutely nothing about what made a big or small hand. All hands looked big to him, compared to the stick-like arms they were attached to. Why had Mistress given him such broad terms?

When looking failed, Diaval decided to look for the other trait Mistress had given. _Stefan._ Perhaps it would be easier to find the correct Stephan than it would be to find the correct brown-haired, blue-eyed, big-handed man. And so Diaval began to focus on what he heard instead of saw, which proved the better path: he caught the whispers almost instantaneously.

 _Stephan._

He didn't know where it had come from at first. Soon it had come again.

 _Stephan._

And again. Here, there, everywhere; the name Stefan lingered on hundreds of lips, hushed and curious and altogether too many to make out properly.

"Stephan." He managed to pick one voice out from the milling din of the crowd. She was young, with a stooped back and bushy brows, clad in a dark dress, a white apron and a white headwrap. She was on a corner, bent down to talk to the three children gathered around her.

Diaval flew closer and took up residence on the streetlamp just above to listen.

"His name is Stefan," she repeated, "and he killed a great beast to be where he is."

"How great a beast?" asked one of the wide-eyed children.

"Oh, a very great one indeed. With massive wings and horns, and––"

"Brunhilda!" Someone was coming out of an alley. Another woman in a dark dress and white apron, older than the stooped one, with a sculptured frown and a hand on her hip. "What are you doing, telling tales at this time of day? The feast will begin in an hour, and someone forgot to take down the tablecloths! We need every hand we can find!"

The stooped one, Brunhilda, straightened and adjusted her headwrap. "Sorry to leave you," she said to the disappointed children. "Clotheslines call, you know. It's no easy task, living in a castle."

The children were shooed away, and Diaval opened his mouth in consternation; she'd almost said it! He'd almost had what he needed! He couldn't just let this escape; the raven took to the air to follow the two women as they slipped into the alleyway, through the tightly-packed stone buildings and deeper into the citadel.

"You like gossip too much," said the elder. "Why do you care so?"

"Maybe you don't gossip enough. It's the _king,_ Margaret. Surely you're _curious?"_

"Stefan will pay my coin. I'm not curious about anything else."

"How do you know he will, though?" Brunhilda pressed. " _I_ heard he was a farmboy, and he turned into a warrior. That doesn't mean he will make a good king."

"You don't really believe the story, do you?" Margaret said dubiously. "I mean, to think that _anyone_ could slay such a beast as that thing in the Moors."

"Of course I believe it," Brunhilda retorted. "He proved it. Brought the beast's wings back for all to see."

"Anyone can cut the wings off a bird and say it came from a she-witch, but that doesn't make it true."

"Don't think Moors-beast wings are quite the same, Hilga. Heard what the soldiers said about her? Beautiful enough to seduce. Horns like a crown. Wings as vast as a dragon's. You can't just find a bird with wings like that and pluck them off. Besides, they're to prove it at the ceremony."

"What do you mean?"

"Stefan's coronation." There was a pause as the two of them entered a small courtyard, where a gaggle of other white-aproned women were in the process of folding massive white cloths. Beyond, under a huge covered pavilion, other cloths billowed about on clotheslines to dry, tended to and fiddled with by more women. Diaval followed Brunhilda and Matilda as they wove their way through the maze of tablecloths; it was a somewhat difficult path, but he managed to flit from line-post to line-post as the two continued their conversation, determined to solve this mystery.

"What about Stefan's coronation?" Matilda asked.

"All the council heard King Henry's conditions: whoever brought proof of the witch's defeat would marry his daughter and become king. They're going to prove he did it."

"How?"

"The wings. Those are his proof. They'll be presented at the coronation, and after that is when he'll be crowned."

"Hmph." Matilda shook her head. "Winged beasts and dead kings. Does no good to think about it. We've got to get these tablecloths down before you speak any more of this, understood?"

"Oh Matilda, you could be a fine gossip if you just tried." With a sigh, the younger set about to the tablecloth nearest to her. "When do you think the ceremony will start?"

Matilda grunted. "If it hasn't already, I imagine it will be any minute."

Diaval heard no more after that. He leaped from the line-post and climbed back into the sky, suddenly desperate in his flight; they were talking about a Stefan, and he hoped to the stars that it was the Stefan he was looking for. This Stefan was meant to be king, then? Diaval knew that kings with castles tended to be found in the largest rooms. Kings liked to be surrounded by other people, especially when events like coronations were taking place. For the largest room, Diaval would seek the largest window.

The largest window wasn't at all hard to find. Tall, broad, with panes oddly flower-shaped, it stood in the center of the castle like a beacon. Unfortunately, there was no way to get _through_ the window, since it didn't seem the sort to actually open up. It took some circling, but soon Diaval caught sight of a smaller, higher window, one that had been cracked to allow air in and out, and it was quite enough of a crack for the raven to slip through. He made his way down and entered the building, hoping to find what it was he had been ordered to look for.

What he found was _people._ Many, many people. They were crowded into the throne room, all shoulder-to-shoulder and mulling about until they ceased to be individuals and blended into a featureless sea of shapes and colors that the raven couldn't possibly hope to comb through. They were all facing forward, however, to look at the raised platform at the head of the room, and that was where Diaval looked, as well.

Atop the platform were two chairs, although they were the thickest and silliest looking chairs he had ever seen. The chairs were flanked by soldiers, and on the chairs were two expensively draped people: a woman, young, pale and possessed of long, honey-colored hair, and a man.

A man with brown hair.

Diaval managed to fly deeper, through the stone supports and pillars.

It was a man with brown hair and blue eyes.

Someone was calling out to the crowd and to the two people on the platform. A priest, it looked to be. Diaval strained to hear.

"… acquiesce to his last wish: to slay the she-demon responsible for his death!" The priest turned to the seated man. "Stefan."

 _Stefan_.

The Stefan stood. "Your grace."

"You claim to have vanquished the beast."

"I did vanquish her."

"Do you bring proof?"

"I cut the wings from her back, and I bring them to you now."

Stefan waved, and a long crate was brought forward. Diaval cocked his head. It was so _large_ … surely the horned she-demon was not quite that big.

His eyes narrowed. _Horned she-demon…_

The case was opened, and a large bundle brought out.

 _The Moors-beast…_

The bundle was undone, the cloth pulled back, and the wings were displayed.

 _Cut the wings from her back…_

Diaval's breath halted. The wings were massive. Brown, like an eagle.

Brown, like her hair.

He couldn't get a good glimpse, not from this angle, because the priest had moved forward and was bending over the wings. Someone else was called up to examine them, then another. The wings were bundled back up––no, he had to see! The raven fluttered on his perch, but they were already being stuffed back in the crate and carried away.

Stefan stood, arms wide as he faced the crown.

"Kneel," the priest commanded.

Stefan knelt. A pageboy darted forward, burdened by a rich red pillow and a glittering golden crown. The priest raised the headpiece and positioned it over Stefan's bowed head.

"I present to you, the first of his line, his Royal Highness, King Stefan."

The applause was meaningless noise in Diaval's ears. He fled the rafters, fled the room, fled the castle––he had to return to the once-castle. He had to tell Mistress… tell her what?

 _Stefan is king. Stefan killed a Moors-beast. Stafan cut off her wings._

The horns on her head. The points on her ears. The blood on her back.

He hardly remembered the flight, so lost was he in thought. He didn't remember the villages, didn't remember the farmlands, didn't remember the border; all the knew was that now it was nighttime and there was scrubland underneath him, and ahead of him was the once-castle, where Mistress would be.

He cawed loudly to announce himself. His first instinct was to go to the tower, where he had first laid eyes on her, but she wasn't there. She was in a courtyard, or perhaps it had once been the throne room; there were steps and a platform, and she stood in the middle, watching him as he descended.

The words of her spell slipped under the wind and into his bones, changing his shape before he had even landed. He hit the ground with his feet, kept moving and pitched forward; there was too much momentum to keep from tumbling into the dirt. She didn't offer to help him up or even turn to face him, remaining as stoic and stone-faced as ever. He couldn't help it; his eyes were drawn to her back, where the cloth that should have been yellow was stained black with clotted blood. It wasn't… it _couldn't…_ he _hadn't_ …

"Well?" she murmured.

Diaval blinked and rolled to his back, then to his knees, then got to his feet; he was in human-skin again, so he could speak.

"I went to the castle," he said, unsure if he wanted to get any closer to her. "I looked for a Stefan with brown hair and blue eyes. I think…" He didn't want to say it.

Her eyes narrowed. "You think?"

"… He's… king, Mistress."

Silence.

"There was a coronation. And there were… wings." He knew he was staring at the wounds on her back, but he couldn't tear his eyes away. "He gave them wings and they gave him a crown."

Silence. Long, terrible silence, and Diaval could only watch her. His instincts told him… no, surely not. Something else, anything else. He wanted a different explanation, even as his heart knew that there was none.

The air changed. It wasn't the wind. It wasn't the pressure. It wasn't the heat. Something snapped and stretched, crawling over the ground and pooling at the feet of his Mistress. Something thick and coarse. Something powerful.

Something dark.

"He did this to me…" It crawled up her robe, growing and thickening until it _glowed_ , curling off her shoulders like green flames. "… so he could be king."

The world stopped. Her power swelled.

His Mistress screamed.

She screamed to the sky, to the stars, to the night, over the miles of distance to Stefan. The once-castle was suddenly on fire with light and heat and the sound of her agonizing cry until Diaval had to shield his eyes from his Mistress's fury. He couldn't see, he couldn't hear, but he _understood._ He understood what he had been hoping to be false.

The king had taken her wings.

As her scream rent the air, spiraling into the sky in a blazing pillar of green fire, Diaval understood with sudden, piercing gravity just what it was she had asked him to do when she had saved him.

 _I need you to be my wings._

Her scream died and her fire waned, and the night was again returned to darkness and dust. The world itself seemed to be ringing with the aftermath of her outburst, although for the life of him Diaval couldn't hear a single movement, _anywhere._

But the fire did not disappear. Even as the light faded, he saw the fire fill her up, burning away that deadness in her eyes and replacing it with scorching rage, untapped and waiting to be unleashed. His Mistress looked back to the castle, eyes ablaze. Now her entire body was speaking, not in the language of humans or fairies, but in the rough, primal language of movements and lines that belonged to the beasts. Her emotions lay bare upon the curve of her shoulders, practically screaming. _Fury,_ they said. _Vast, unimaginable fury._ Soon that fury became _pain, betrayal,_ and then, finally, it morphed into a piercing, unbreakable _determination._

Diaval observed her, curious and uncertain. "Now what, Mistress?"

Without answering, his Mistress spared one last terrible look at the castle, then turned and began to walk.

* * *

As always, I'd love to know what you think! Constructive criticism is always wanted!


End file.
